


Not Single Spies (but Battalions)

by AssassinOfRome



Series: Leviticus 19:28 [1]
Category: A Series of Unfortunate Events (TV), A Series of Unfortunate Events - Lemony Snicket, All the Wrong Questions - Lemony Snicket
Genre: Angst, Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Lemony Snicket is not a happy boy, Making my debut into the Snicket fandom with something suitably miserable and depressing, Meta, Self-Destruction, Self-Harm, holy fuck... he's twelve, maybe? - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-03
Updated: 2017-06-03
Packaged: 2018-11-08 15:59:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11085009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AssassinOfRome/pseuds/AssassinOfRome
Summary: "It’s in her nature as a journalist to question and interrogate, yet he dodges her enquiries with a practised and surprising ease, for someone who looks so so tired."Everyone has secrets, Lemony Snicket more than most. Moxie searches for answers, and doesn't like what she finds.





	Not Single Spies (but Battalions)

Lemony Snicket is extremely self destructive; in adulthood, he’d drink and smoke, and skip sleep and meals, attempting to destroy his body passively, rather than taking it the whole way actively. But maybe this behaviour started in Stain’d-By-The-Sea? 

Maybe one day, Moxie notices that Lemony has a suspicious bandage on his wrist, wrapped tight - too tight. She asks him about it, and instantly sees a change in him. He’s always been quiet and sombre, but these last few days, he’s seemed even more morose; she caught him getting tearful a few times, though he never cries. This brings on another one of those looks; his brown eyes, usually warmy and cheeky, beginning to brim with tears. In his language, he’s as eloquent as ever, dismissing it as a light scratch from a case she hadn’t been invited too, that he simply didn’t want to get infected. But his body language gives him away - he hunches up, folding his arms and tapping his fingers. Upon further questioning, he becomes shifty, snappy and defensive, eventually stalking off to the library and leaving Moxie alone with nothing but a typewriter and a heart bursting with worry. 

More and more plasters appear over the coming days, on his hands, on his wrists. Once, on a sweltering hot day, Moxie watches as he goes to roll up his sleeves, before jerking them down again, eyes glancing around to check no-one saw. He locks eyes with her, and scowls. They don’t speak for a few days after that, and Snicket is nowhere to be found that weekend. Jake theorises that Markson took him on a mission, but her car is seen outside of the Lost Arms. He’s hiding from them. 

Eventually he emerges, looking haggard and ill, wrapping his jacket around him tightly despite the blazing heat of the summer sun. Moxie notes that he now has a bulky bandage around his forearm, and can’t help but ask him about it. It’s in her nature as a journalist to question and interrogate, yet he dodges her enquiries with a practised and surprising ease, for someone who looks so so tired. Irritated by his evasion, Moxie reaches for the bandage and rips it off before Lemony can retaliate, though he screams in shock, 

There’s a cut. 

It’s deep and dark and Moxie can tell by the blood beading up to the surface that it’s fresh. She inspects it and realises it’s very neat and straight and thin; far more so than any casual scratch. It’s not even jagged, like one would expect in a fight. She gasps in horror when she realises that it was made deliberately, when she realises just what he’s done to himself. 

And this isn’t the first time; her eyes roam over his arm and it’s covered in similar, smaller slices. Yet this is the worst of them all, the crowning glory. An attempt, she thinks, to end his life. She recoils in shock and ogles her friend; her exhausted, frightened, broken friend. 

And that’s when Lemony starts to laugh, low and soft. 

Moxie is confused, until the giggling turns harsh and bitter, echoing around the room. She sees the tears spilling down his cheeks, how his shoulders shake, and how he begins to claw at his sleeve. He’s manic, she realises, downright manic. And how does he respond to her horror? With the statement that breaks Moxie’s heart into a thousand pieces. 

“Hey look, Mox. Now we match."


End file.
